Conventionally, as a recording apparatus which records on a recording medium such as paper, an image forming apparatus having an inkjet head is known. This image forming apparatus comprises a conveying mechanism which conveys a recording medium in the form of sheets, e.g. paper. A conveyor belt is disposed therein as a conveying device of a recording medium. In the conveying mechanism, as the number of conveyed recording media to be printed increases, foreign objects such as paper dust or dust of dried ink adhere to the conveyor belt. The foreign objects or dirt adhered to a conveyor belt are removed by way of raking with a blade disposed in a path of a conveyor belt, electro static adsorption, adhesion adsorption, vacuum adsorption or having an a water-bearing roller or brush abut on the conveyor belt.
However, with the conventional skill described above, the cleaning capability deteriorates gradually as more foreign objects such as dirt or ink adhere to a surface of a conveyor belt, and sufficient cleaning capability cannot be achieved. Moreover, mechanical cleaning such as with a blade or a brush has included possibility that some conveyor belts, depending on the material, could be scratched by a blade or a brush when being cleaned thereby.
On the other hand, various devices and methods for a direct cleaning of a recording medium are conventionally known.
For example, the patent document 1 identified below discloses an art to adhere powder dust remained on a recording medium to an adhesive sheet by unrolling the adhesive sheet from an unrolling roller disposed in a feed path of a recording medium, and rolling the adhesive sheet with a collection roller disposed above the unrolling roller.
In case of this art, however, one pair of unrolling and collection rollers is always required. Particularly, space for collection roller is necessary. Furthermore, a mechanism such as a roll drive device is required to roll an adhesive sheet on a collection roller. It has consequently made the size of an image forming apparatus larger, or caused possibility of making the entire mechanism of an image forming apparatus complicated.
Additionally, a cleaning with a cleaning roller which has an adhesive sheet applied to its surface is suggested. However, in this case, the adhesive sheet whose cleaning capability has gone down needs to be replaced manually to a new sheet.
(Patent document 1)                Unexamined Japanese patent publication No. 2000-318864        